8 a.m CST: I announce the party with a gift card and a giveaway!
9 a.m: New York Times bestselling author Cynthia Eden kicks it off with giveaways 🙂
10 a.m.: Maree Anderson – my New Zealand author connection, who is a multi-award winning author whose first book was optioned for TV!
11 a.m.: Mary Hughes, who publishes her fun and witty romances with Samhain, Crimson, and now is dipping her toes into self-publishing 🙂
Noon: USA and Amazon bestselling author Stacey Joy Netzel who started with small town books set in Wisconsin (like me!), but expanded into Europe with her Italy Intrigue series.
1 p.m.: USA bestselling author Marilyn Brant, who is a great writer, friend, and one of the sweetest person I know.
1:30 p.m.: Donna Marie Rogers – author of the popular Redemption series, she writes sweet books with steam.
2 p.m.: Lori Brighton – I’m not sure if she’s a bestselling author yet, but if not, she’ll be there soon!
2:30 p.m.: Me with another gift card!
3 p.m.: Dale Mayer – ditto what I said about Lori. Dale is one of the most prolific writers I know!
3:30 p.m.: Michelle Diener, a Simon & Schuster author, whose historical romances have gotten great acclaim!
4 p.m.: Casey Clifford writes stories about wise women – which could be easy for her, because she’s so wise.
4:30 p.m.: Elle J Rossi, a multi talented author, singer and cover artist writes fantastical stories with a dark edge that keep you turning the pages.
5 p.m.: Leigh Morgan combining romance and martial arts training, she writes stories that make you care 🙂
6 p.m.: Me with a last gift card

But it’s not over yet! The posts are open for comments until 8 a.m. the next morning. I’ll choose the winners through Random.org, and I’ll announce them sometime tomorrow.

My other news is that I finished the second revision of my novella, Mixing It Up. It’s a Galaxy Girls story. The main character is Ki, Phyrne’s aunt. Of course, pheromones are involved. 🙂 I sent Mixing It Up to a beta reader and will undoubtedly have to make more changes.

While I’m waiting to hear back, I can play catch up. I updated my newsletter subscriber list, signed on for Kindlegraph, will do filing, take the dogs for a walk, and do formatting. Notice what I put last? Not my favorite thing to do, but I’m determined to do it. Sometime this week – maybe tomorrow – I’ll start the short story that I’ll send to my newsletter subscribers for free. It’s a Haunted Hearts story, and will feature Cassie and Luke from Dead People. Joe the ghost, Cassie’s best friend, might or might not make an appearance. I discover these things as I write the book.

I suppose I should start talking about a book that Karin Tabke and I co-wrote and will self-publish. The book is ready. We’re waiting for the cover from the fabulous Laura Morrigan. We’ll probably get it at the end of the month or early in December. It’s a very fun book, nothing like either of us normally write. We both love it! In fact, Karin’s agent loved it, but we decided to go indie with it. I’m really looking forward to putting this out there.

Cynthia Eden had a HUGE DOUBLE RELEASE PARTY for Entangled and for her new e-novella Bound in Darkness. She has tons of giveaways, with many guest authors. I’m giving away Cattitude and Galaxy Girls. I asked the age-old question “If you could be an animal, which one would you like to be?” Someone said a unicorn, which I loved. Big cats seem to be the favorite. The contest is still good until noon today (the 13th). So, go and comment on my post and any others.

I’m giving away an e-copy of Entangled at Magical Musings, too. I’m announcing the winner tomorrow, so you have until then to comment and have a chance to win.

Entangled is on two bestselling lists already. I am so frickin’ excited!

Yesterday was proof that bad things come in 3s. They were irritating bad things – starting with my internet connection not connecting – and not tragedies. (After two hours, I did get online.) Good things happened, too, and I’m all about good things. DRAGON BLUES is featured in the September issue of RT Book Reviews! It’s on page 23, and it looks gorgeous! It’s under What’s HOT This Month in Self-Publishing. They mention DEAD PEOPLE, too, which finalled in the RT-sponsored American Title V contest.

Even more exciting things are on their way, as you can see by this fantastic cover by Laura Morrigan.

Cynthia Eden talks about it on her blog, and has an excerpt from her story. Later, I’ll blog about it and put up an excerpt from my story, The Fat Cat.

Zoe Winters, Lori Brighton, M.A. Golla, and Marcia Colette all published books this week. Cynthia Eden had an e-book release! And I’m not forgetting Aimee from Coffee Table Romance. It’s her birthday today!

Birthdays first. Aimiee is celebrating hers with March Madness Giveaways. I’m helping her celebrate, giving away an e-copy of DRAGON BLUES, DEAD PEOPLE and CATTITUDE. Jennifer Estep and Jaye Wells are also giving away 3 books. Other writers giving away books are Lisa McMann, Kimberly Derting, Deirdre Martin, and Julie James. Stop off at Coffee Table Press to wish Aimee a happy birthday and see the contest details.

DEADLY LIES by Cynthia Eden made the Bookscan Top 100 Bestsellers List! It was published in print on February 22nd. On Tuesday, it became available in e-book at most online retail sellers. Buy it and you won’t be sorry. Her books rock!

Zoe Winters and Lori Brighton both have short stories in a collection, KISS ME, KILL ME, along with H.P. Mallory and 6 other writers. It’s only 99 cents! A great bargain. And all proceeds go to charity. You can read fabulous stories and at the same time feel virtuous for giving money to charity. I think it should be a tax write off as well. Win-win-win. (I already bought it.) You can read about it at Lori’s blog, where she also talks about her other new release. WILD DESIRE, a historical with paranormal elements, is her spinoff to WILD HEART. It’s published by Kensington, and is available in print and ebook.

To celebrate the release day of the GOBLIN’S APPRENTICE, M.A. Golla is having a giveaway of her first middle grade book, LOST LEPRECHAUN LOOT. You can read the details at her blog. And isn’t that the cutest cover? It’s by my cover artist, Laura Morrigan. She really is the best! And reasonable! And fast! You can find out more about her here.

I’m putting Marcia Colette last, though she’s a first kind of gal, because her YA paranormal, BITTERSWEET — her first self-published book! — isn’t on Amazon or Barnes & Noble as I type. She uploaded it on March 1st, and it will probably be available by the time you read this. If you can’t wait for either of those sites, you can get it on Smashwords in almost any format.

A lot of great books to read. I’m reading SAVE MY SOUL by Zoe Winters now. I’m at 70% on Kindle, and I’m loving it.

I’m planning my release party for DRAGON BLUES, which will be available at the usual online places soon. I’m having a BIG DEAL, so stay tuned for more details.

I haven’t posted my cover on my website yet, so here it is. Isn’t it beautiful?

I’m at Cynthia Eden’s today talking about Deadly Couples in film and books. Stop over and tell me who your favorite mismatched couples are.

Today, I have two things to be extra happy about. First a 5 star review for CATTITUDE. And since I live in Wisconsin, I’m THRILLED about the Packers winning. You can imagine there are a lot of people in this state walking around with giant smiles today. I’m not a big football fan, but I watched about half the game last night. The ending was a nail biter! Up until that last minute, it could’ve gone either way.

How about you? Did you watch the game? I’ve got to say, that for the most part, the commercials were way over-hyped. The two I liked were for Budweiser and Coca Cola.

I’m lucky to have phenomenal friends who are great writers. And I’m happy because two of them have new books out right now! Yesterday was the release day for DEADLY HEAT by Cynthia Eden. It’s her first straight romantic suspense! On Feb. 1st, it will be available in e-book. That’s when I’ll probably get it, unless I get to a bookstore before then. She’s blogging at Magical Musings today, and she has a giveaway!

Another book that I’ve been waiting to be released for months is SAVE MY SOUL by Zoe Winters. As of yesterday, it’s available at Amazon, with other digital outlets coming soon. It’s only $2.99 for a limited time, and then will go up to $4.95. (Which is still a bargain!) You can read the blurb here and the excerpt here.

Tomorrow I’ll post an excerpt from TUESDAY’S CHILD by Dale Mayer. Dale’s one of the last four finalists in Kensington Brava / RT Book Reviews Writing for the Stars contest! In her blog at Magical Musings yesterday, Amy Atwell called Dale a Real Life Heroine. I agree!

And I want to give a shout out to the Green Bay Packers and all their fans!!!!! They’re going to the Super Bowl!!!!!!!

Congrats to the Steelers’ fans, too. It’s going to be an FANTASTIC game!

I just revised a scene that put my heroine close to death. It was intense, and I need time off to breathe.

I’ve been concentrating on my revisions and have been remiss in blogging. (I like that word “remiss.”) Tuesday was my husband’s birthday, and we went kayaking in the morning and out to eat in the evening. Yesterday, I blogged at the Five Scribes about the joys, the sorrows and the pitfalls of self-publishing. Since I’ve experienced a lot of joy during this process, it’s one of the favorite blogs that I’ve written. Thanks to Donnell Bell for giving me such a great topic!

Today I’m at the Book Girl of Mur-y-Castell with an interview and a giveaway. It’s a book review site, and I’m happy to be there. Stop off and say hi if you get a chance.

Jennifer Estep is at Magical Musings today with a great blog. Venom, the third book of her Elemental Assassin urban fantasy series, will be out soon. She’s doing so well and her books are gaining her many fans. One reviewer I contacted had just reviewed Web of Lies, Jennifer’s second Elemental Assassin book, and I mentioned that I knew Jennifer. The reviewer gushed about how much she loved Jennifer’s books, and I think I went up a couple notches in her estimation. 😎

I’ve been restraining myself from mentioning the reviews Cattitude has gotten, though I love them all, but I can’t resist linking to this review from Meankitty and Jody Wallace. It made me laugh — and Jody praised my comma usage. 🙂

Big squeals for Marilyn Brant and Cynthia Eden!!!!! They both have releases this week! Cynthia with her novella in The Naughty List, in which good girl toy inventor Christie takes a walk on the naughty side when she sparks a no-strings fling with Santa—actually, sexy cop Jonas in a Santa suit. It’s a bit lighter than Cynthia normally writes and sounds like a lot of fun.

Marilyn’s book, Friday Mornings at Nine, is about three women who answer the questions: What if they all married the wrong man? What if they’re living the wrong life? And what would happen if, just once, they gave in to temptation…

The fabulous Cynthia Eden called me fabulous! 😎 I’m guest blogging at her place (with a giveaway), and when I looked at the title this morning, “How to keep your brains from melting,” I realized it should be “brain.” We have one brain, with two halves, and inside of it we have brain cells.

Maybe people will think I meant “your” collectively instead of “your” specifically.

Can you tell I’ve been revising? It’s awful when I do it. I’m reading a book that I enjoy, yet I keep wanting to pick at little things. And she has dense paragraphs. I want to cut them in half. Sometimes I want to cut them in three.

I started off great yesterday, revising for an hour and a half before I opened up the Internet. Then I revised before I went to bed. When I finished my morning revision, I felt happy. But while I was getting ready for bed last night, I thought that I wasn’t happy with my evening pages. Then it dawned on me what I needed to do to add depth and shake up my pages. I’d forgotten something I figured out the last time I revised–which was last week.

Argh. And of course when I was in bed, I had to pop up, scurry to my office, and scribble down another idea to fix the pages.

Today looks to be busier than yesterday, but I will revise. I’ll revise every day, even if it’s just a page or two. I don’t want to forget something important again.

The amazing Amy Atwell has her first blog up at Magical Musings. If you have a moment, stop off and say hi to her–and to me at the fabulous Cynthia Eden’s.